Very interesting! I've never seen this either. Maybe one of our other members can shed some light on this one.

-Mark

Interesting. I've never seen that either. The rounded corners indicate a later badge (1979ish-1983). The numbers after the "L" do not appear to be within the regular sequence from badges of that era.

IIRC the earliest version of the Rocker series had B/O badges and cortex finishes. Is it possible they used a separate numbering sequence on those drums? What are the other details of this set? Could these be a set of those?

KCdrumdad may have the answer, Ludwig serial numbers are among his areas of expertise.

Out of the 4 pc's on this kit only the floor tom has the 7 digit badge. The shell layup is 7 ply and looks like mostly maple wood too. IIRC, Rockers were always 4 ply on the toms but 6 ply on the kicks. I hope these aren't Rockers, if they are it means I over paid :/

First and last digit/letter don't appear to be factory but from a different stamp?

I tend to agree with BEC, when badges are stamped they are placed on a hard surface so the letters are clean and crisp, the first and last look like they have be stamped with badge on the drum, distorted and pulled the badge material in with the stamping.

maybe some ones code to keep track of his drums?

Now that I think about it the series I was thinking of were actually called "Standards" but, of course, were not the same as the Standards that Ludwig made in the late 60s early 70s.

I agree with BEC. The numbers don't look right. I know they have blank pointy badges early 70's but did they have blank rounded badges? It then looks like it was stamped and also the grommet has a split. I took a picture of my 4 ply rocker badge (1988) for reference and type of numbers where you can see the 3 and 1 Are quite different.

Wayne

Also, no black border around the weird serial.

That split in the grommet is not so uncommon. See those on original drums quite often.

Mike